Personal branded domain (mattpeplinski.com) or a branded domain (empiricspirit.com) to promote books?

One approach would be to (1) Create a website from which your product can be purchased and downloaded; (2) Enable easy social sharing from the website so that happy customers multiply at no cost to you; (3) Market that site through PPC campaigns, targeting relevant search verticals. Basically, you'd be paying a commission to Google and Bing in exchange fore eyeballs on your site. Whether those impressions convert to sales depends on your presentation and (of course) the product itself. Conceivably, you might do all this yourself. But you might prefer to pay (1) A branding consultant / namer / domain broker to select and obtain the ideal domain name to use, (2) A web designer to build the site, (3) An SEM specialist to manage your AdWords and Bing campaigns, (4) A copy writer to craft your landing page sales pitch, improving your sales funnel and boosting conversion rates, (5) A content writer to produce additional articles, (6) An SEO to work on whatever it is they do this month. It isn't strictly necessary to pay for these services, if you're willing to teach yourself. You might accelerate that process and avoid expensive mistakes if you schedule a few short Clarity.fm calls with relevant experts. That's the approach I would use – building a site that functions like a store and advertising online through SEM. This way you can test the viability of your product without having to hire sales staff. Yes, you could try marketing through other channels such as local gatherings of college-bound students or via phone, email, radio, TV, mail, etc. But online you can access a broad range of potential customers with less initial investment in planning, staffing, and infrastructure. So it's a test case. If your product can't sell online in this way, then it may not be worth expanding with those other strategies. Furthermore, this online approach scales very well. If you're profitable while spending X on PPC, then you might grow those profits simply by reinvesting and raising that advertising budget. I offer professional services for #1 (names / domains) and #4 (sales pitch) above, if you're interested. To some extent, I know my way around #3 (SEM); but I don't manage campaigns for clients - only suggest tactics for those who run their own campaigns. Plenty of Clarity.fm experts could run an SEM campaign for you quite well if you'd like to outsource that marketing.

Basically, the question is this: Are people reading the book for your writing, or for your ideas? If it's for your writing (say, if you're a fiction author) then you should probably write it yourself. It'd be disingenuous not to. If they're interested in your ideas (which is the case with most Kindle non-fiction books), then what's important is that your ideas aren't lost. That doesn't mean ghostwriting is fine, only that you need to find an efficient way to get your ideas out without wasting your time writing. Basically, the process I use is to outline the book myself, sit down with a microphone, and talk through the entire book (basically recording a really rough draft of the audiobook straight from the outline). Then I transcribe it, and then hire a "writer" to work from the transcription to the finished text. That way it's high quality and maintains my ideas, but I don't have to do all the work of typing. I wrote a book that breaks down the process in a bit more detail (especially the process of outlining, how to record effectively, how to find that editor, etc.), but basically what I said above is all you really need to know. Here's the link if you want to check it out: www.amazon.com/Book-Box-Method-Quickly-Easily-ebook/dp/B014EUTYGM/

Obviously you need to generate more leads. But then you need to segment your list. Your basic list are those leads who "come aboard" and want to know what's going on. Your qualified leads list are your potential buyers. Between the two, you need a gate. So, they come on your big list. Then they need to get something that qualifies them from being a basic prospect to being a qualified prospect. That puts them on the second list. Leads >> Qualifier >> Qualified Leads. What's the topic of your book? Qualify by things people have said in similar book reviews. This is a lot easier if you are doing non-fiction, but it's possible with fiction as well. In the reviews you'll see people saying things like, "I bought this book because..." What they say after that is the pain point. Use this language, as they wrote it, in your qualifier. For example, in a review for SPIN Selling, someone says, " I don't do "hit and run," one-time sales. Tom Hopkins and Zig Ziglar offer great tactics for those kind of salespeople, but they don't work for me." Another says, "...I had no idea how to sell professionally. I had already read a few books by Tom Hopkins, but felt he was targeting used-car salesmen types. It seems as though Hopkins' techniques relied on "closing" gimmicks when it came down to it. (I must say I did learn some good principles from Hopkins, but his gimmicky style is not for me.) I was instantly attracted to SPIN SELLING when I saw that (1) it was based on extensive research, and (2) it dealt primarily with the large sale. Since I want to start my own corporation after my MBA, and want to have Fortune-500 companies as my customers, I realized SPIN SELLING was for me." See the commonality? So if I was launching a solid B2B sales techniques book, I would make use of this language. First, I would attract them to my basic list with the promise of a corporate B2B sales book. Then, I would qualify further with language like, "Are you looking to build real relationships with your customers, instead of hit-and-run one-time sales tricks? Are you eager to understand the secrets of professional corporate selling?" A Call To Action would follow. Those who respond to this language are qualified leads, as salespeople in other situations would not resonate with that copy. How can you transfer what I've shown you here to your niche? If you're writing non-fiction, as I said, it should be straightforward. If it's fiction, then you can find similar stories and pull from the reviews for those...the things they say they like about the author's style (assuming yours is like theirs), the story structure, the excitement, the thought process, or whatever. Why not just go straight for the qualified leads? Because your net won't be big enough. Better to grab a whole lot of interested readers, which you can make use of later as well, and qualify from there.

Hi: To start, think concentric circles: * At the core, you have those you know well in the space—individuals who will take your call, most likely be your first customers and, hopefully, will be your champions. * Next ring out, you have acquaintances—people you have met briefly at conferences, industry events, etc., who were interested enough to share a business card. * And at the outer ring, you have the bulk of the industry—these are the folks who will be the target of your broader content management campaigns. As you gain traction in the inner two circles, it will make approaching the industry masses much easier. If you wish to discuss, send me a PM through Clarity for 15 free minutes. Cheers, Kerby

It can depend on the type of book and goal for your book. But the strategies I know of working and that have worked for me. Involved building an audience of your own and leveraging other peoples audiences. So if you don't have an audience go through and find the thought leaders and personalities in that space. Chat with them about the book and see if you can get them on your launch team. Start Sending out advanced copies to these people to get their feedback and support. Then you want to create some pre-sale freebies. With Mark Mason The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck. Had a bunch of freebies if you pre-orded it for 20 bucks or something. He also appeared on a shit load of podcasts and had a bunch of people promoting his pre-launch.